Amazon's New Service, Amazon Inspire, Will Do Just That for Educators

Amazon Inspire is fee-free and there's no additional cost to use materials and resources available to you. So, educators: Sign up now while it's still in beta mode, and your 2016–2017 school year might just get a little easier!

"With Amazon Inspire, we aim to quickly and easily put the best and most trusted digital resources at teachers' fingertips, saving them valuable time that can be devoted to what they do best and enjoy most — teaching," said Rohit Agarwal, General Manager of Amazon K-12 Education.

"If we could enable every teacher to contribute resources or help discover them, we could collectively raise access for the 3 million-plus teachers out there," he told TechCrunch.

Features will include:

Smart search: Educators can explore resources by grade level, and filter by more than 10 criteria.

Simple upload: Amazon Inspire will have drag-and-drop functionality; educators can add metadata such as grade and subject, and content-publish within a few minutes.

Customer reviews: Educators will have the ability to rate and review resources.

Accessibility: Amazon Inspire will be compatible with screen readers, and educators can describe the features of accessibility a resource has.

Early contributors to Amazon Inspire include Tulare County Office of Education in Visalia, California and Mineola Public Schools in New York State. The U.S. Department of Education is adding content from College Scorecard, allowing teachers to access information to best guide their students to the right college. Six early-adopter school districts and four early-adopter states across the country have already been sharing and curating materials for Amazon Inspire.

The Folger Shakespeare Library is also a contributor to Amazon Inspire. There are more than 100 teaching resources added by the library, with an estimated 2,000 more added in time for the 2016–2017 school year.

"We're mentors, facilitators, coaches, listeners, and learners," said Michael Buist, a teacher at Knox Gifted Academy in Chandler, Arizona. "We're sherpas. And if it's our job to get our students to the top of the mountain, we also need help. We need inspiration and resources. Amazon Inspire is that place to not only share, but learn from each other and enhance our craft."

Currently, educators can request access — or if they already have a code, log in — to Amazon Inspire at AmazonInspire.com/access.

Leanna YipCopy EditorLeanna Yip is the copy editor at BestProducts.com, where she’s been on staff since 2015.